Month: November 2010

Who’s afraid of a polygraph test? Not Afghanistan’s most notorious reputed drug lord, who is on the CIA payroll.

Jeff Stein reports in his Washington Post SpyTalk column that a secret State Department cable recently published by Wikileaks reveals that Ahmed Wali Karzai, the half-brother of Afghan president Hamid Karzai, wanted a polygraph test to clear himself of narcotics allegations. The relevant paragraph of the cable, dated 25 February 2010, is this:

The document does not indicate whether the United States government took Karzai up on the offer. That Karzai, reputedly the wealthiest narcotics trafficker in Afghanistan, is not afraid of a polygraph “test” about whether he is involved in narcotics trafficking should give the U.S. Government pause about its continued reliance on polygraphy, which has no scientific basis and is vulnerable to simple countermeasures that anyone can learn.

Perhaps this Afghan drug lord on the CIA payroll understands more about polygraphy than the CIA does.

Washington Post staff writer Peter Finn reports in an above-the-fold front page article on the case of retired army lieutenant colonel and Defense Intelligence Agency analyst John Dullahan, whose security clearance was suspended in February 2009 after he failed three polygraph “tests.” Then DIA director LTG Michael D. Maples fired Dullahan in March 2009 (his last month as director).

DIA refuses to state its reasons for terminating LTC Dullahan, averring that “the interests of the nation do not permit disclosure to the employee of specific information about the reasons for his removal from federal service,” and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has not responded to an appeal Dullahan submitted some 18 months ago.